During the past half century, bipartisan support from
Congress and the administration for the NIH and NCI has
enabled extraordinary progress against cancer. In doing
so, it has saved countless lives, created jobs, and promoted
economic growth in the United States. It has also catalyzed
the development of the biotechnology industry and secured
the United States position as the global leader in science
and innovation. ;erefore, if we are to increase the rate of
progress we are making in the battle against cancer, while
at the same time ensure that economic growth in the life
sciences continues, it will require sustainable increases in
federal funding for the NIH and NCI (see sidebar on NIH: A
Catalyst of Progress).

From Jan. 1, 2010, through July 31, 2014, we have realized
remarkable returns on the federal government’s prior
investments in cancer research through the NIH and NCI.
In fact, in those four and a half years, 39 new anticancer
agents and 11 new uses for previously approved anticancer
therapeutics have been FDA approved. In addition, this
time period saw four new imaging technologies and FDA
clearance for broad clinical use of a DNA sequencing
machine and reagents.

For the NIH and NCI to have the resources required
to build upon prior and current progress, biomedical
research must once again become a national priority for
our policymakers. Members of Congress must restore
the $1.6 billion in NIH funding that was cut as a result of
sequestration, and provide sustained funding increases at a
rate that is at least comparable to biomedical in;ation (see
Figure 14, p. 90). In fact, NIH’s current funding level is $3.5
billion less than where it would be today if it had simply
grown at the same rate as biomedical in;ation since 2010;
this translates to a loss of more than $5 billion in purchasing
power since that time.

Develop and Retain the Workforce of
Tomorrow

As a result of diminished federal support for biomedical
research, a new research grant application to the NIH in
2013 had a less than one in six chance of receiving funding
(152). Faced with an inability to sustain their research
programs, some established NIH-funded investigators
are leaving the ;eld, which means that there are fewer
opportunities for training. In addition, with fewer and
smaller grants (153, 154), some established researchers are
unable to take on new graduate students and postdoctoral
scientists, and expert laboratory sta; members have been
let go. ;ese cuts not only reduce the research capacity of
our nation’s laboratories but they also discourage promising
trainees and early career scientists from even pursuing
a career in cancer research, an outcome that has grave
consequences for future innovation in the ;eld. By adversely
a;ecting the promise and progress in cancer research, these
losses will unquestionably be detrimental to the lives of
patients with cancer in the future.

In addition to allocating the funds necessary to recruit and
retain the best and the brightest to the ;eld of biomedical
research, we must equip our workforce with the knowledge
and skills to conduct state-of-the-art cancer research (see
sidebar on World Class Training, p. 90). Cancer is a complex
disease requiring multifaceted and interdisciplinary
solutions. Further, an understanding of the advances in one
;eld can have a profound e;ect on another. For example,